A numbers game

Thursday

Feb 7, 2013 at 12:01 AM

STOCKTON - Kassani Newson and her second-grade classmates sat in a darkened classroom this week, each at a laptop computer, each tapping a mouse pad to try to solve the problem that would allow an animated penguin named JiJi to cross a virtual obstacle.

Roger Phillips

STOCKTON - Kassani Newson and her second-grade classmates sat in a darkened classroom this week, each at a laptop computer, each tapping a mouse pad to try to solve the problem that would allow an animated penguin named JiJi to cross a virtual obstacle.

"When you get it right, you get a point," 7-year-old Kassani said. "If you get to 100, you get to go to the next level. It's like a little game."

It may have seemed like a game, but Kassani and her El Dorado Elementary classmates were learning mathematical concepts with the help of instructional software purchased last summer by Stockton Unified. The software, ST Math, is intended for K-5 students but also is being used in some cases to assist middle-school children struggling to grasp math concepts.

"The program teaches conceptually," El Dorado Principal Kristin Buckenham said. "A lot of our students were struggling with the procedures to figure out math concepts. This reinforces the teachers' direct instruction."

The purchase of ST Math was one of the first items on Superintendent Steve Lowder's agenda when he took charge in June. Lowder said the program, created by the Santa Ana-based Mind Research Institute nonprofit group, had benefited students at his previous district in Hemet. He believed it also would aid the children of Stockton Unified.

On Aug. 28, Stockton Unified's school board unanimously approved spending $2.6 million in restricted funds to purchase ST Math. Three days later, the state released 2012 California Testing and Reporting scores that provided a jarring reminder of just how far Stockton Unified's students were lagging.

The scores showed that only 45 percent of Stockton Unified's second- through fifth-grade students had scored in the proficient or advanced range on the math portion of the 2012 STAR tests - in stark contrast to the 67 percent statewide rate.

"It was a natural for us," Lowder said of ST Math. "You could do it immediately and have serious positive benefits for kids."

According to the Mind Research Institute, ST Math was used by about half a million students nationwide in 2012. The institute reports that in the regions where it has studied outcomes, students using ST Math achieve grade-level proficiency more frequently - sometimes much more frequently - than students who have not used the software. According to the institute, the students whose results were studied were attending schools in the lowest 30 percent of math achievement.

In its teaching of concepts starting with kindergarten addition and advancing to fifth-grade algebraic expressions, ST Math begins by staying away from numbers, arithmetic symbols and language. Instead, students learn concepts by helping JiJi the Penguin surmount various obstacles by performing virtual tasks on their laptop screens.

"They have to figure out from pictures what the program is asking them to do," El Dorado fourth-grade teacher Carol Lozano said. "It's a very different way of looking at mathematical problems."

Second-grade teacher Phannara Has added, "The kids are intrigued by it, and they are using their own strategies to figure out the problems. They have to use their thinking skills."

ST Math has been in use in Stockton Unified for only a few months, too soon for a comprehensive read of whether it is helping the district's students. But Buckenham said early assessment data is promising, and Has said on one recent fractions assessment, 28 of his 30 students were at least proficient. Ordinarily, Has said, he would have expected only about a 50 percent proficiency rate.

El Dorado fourth-grade student Jasmine Olvera said she's a fan of the new software.